Grand Junction is a city of about 48,000 residents located in western Colorado, near the Utah border and situated along Interstate 70. Prostitution and sex trafficking are well-documented local problems. For example, in 2008, a well-known brothel, Fuji Oriental Massage, was seized and later auctioned by the IRS. The forfeiture occurred after law enforcement determined that the property had been used in the commission of crime, for which the brothel owners and operators were also convicted. Local sex trafficking cases include a 2012 case in which 14 people were arrested for involvement in a human-trafficking ring that brought teenage girls to Grand Junction and other Colorado cities for prostitution. The leaders were charged with trafficking of children, pimping of a child, and inducement of child prostitution. The four key traffickers allegedly recruited five girls, all under the age of 18, to perform acts of prostitution for a six-month period in 2012. The girls were brought to hotel rooms in Grand Junction, Glenwood Springs, Denver, Boulder and Lakewood to use drugs and alcohol and perform sexual acts for money, according to the indictment. Eight additional people named in the indictment were charged with providing a place for the incidents of prostitution to occur and/or driving the girls to places where they were exploited. In addition to such evidence of prostitution and child sex trafficking, and rape of exploited minors, Grand Junction has also documented one case of a prostituted woman who was murdered in 2007. She advertised through online ads, and the person who was last known to have seen her alive was a sex buyer.

In their efforts to address such serious problems stemming from the local commercial sex market, police have arrested several sex buyers in at least two investigations. For example, in 2013, police arrested a man on four charges, including patronizing a prostituted child, soliciting for child prostitution, pandering of a child and sexual assault on a child. The man was arrested on allegations he arranged to pay $100 for sex at a Clifton motel with a 14-year-old girl, who was pimped via Craigslist by another man. While perhaps not traditional reverse sting operations, the investigations, arrests, and the release of identities of at least three buyers of sex with children represents proactive attempts to hold at least some johns accountable, and perhaps to deter others.

In October 2015, five men were arrested in Mesa County in an investigation targeting Internet solicitation of child prostitution. In April 2019, law enforcement personnel arrested 10 people over three days in a multi-agency undercover operation targeting people seeking to purchase sex with children. The operation involved undercover officers posing online as youths offering to have sex, or adults arranging for children to have sex with suspects. Police placed ads on sites including skipthegames.com and Cityxguide.com. While the ages listed were 19 as required by the sites, the ensuing conversations leading to several arrests involved discussions arranging to have sex with children. Some of the conversations involved undercover personnel posing as mothers making their daughters available for purchased sex, with the age of the daughters ranging between 12 and 14 years.  Police worked with two hotels that agreed to partner on the operations, and some of the arrests were made on hotel premises after arrangements were made to meet suspects there.  Six people were arrested for allegedly making such arrangements with undercover officers. Three were issued misdemeanor summonses for prostitution. One more person was arrested on a warrant for failure to appear, in connection with a recent arrest by the Mesa County Sheriff’s Office involving an alleged sexual assault on a 14-year-old victim.  The man was also held on suspicion of violating a protection order by communicating with the victim. The names, ages, and charges associated with all of the arrested individuals were posted in news releases.  Charges included soliciting for child prostitution, criminal attempt of sexual assault on a child;  soliciting for child prostitution, internet luring of a child with intent of sexual contact/exploitation, pandering a child, patronizing a prostituted child, drug possession and distribution, and weapons possession by a repeat offender. Collaborating on the operation were the Grand Junction and Palisade police departments, the Colorado State Patrol, Colorado Bureau of Investigation, Homeland Security Investigations, the U.S. Marshals Service, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and the Mesa County District Attorney’s Office.